Dracula Schmacula (1974)

Dracula Schmacula 

By Tom Dupreee

Zoo World

June 6, 1974

    With searchlights, hearses, a hot air balloon, a Dracula makeup contest, a street dance, and assorted other promotional avenues, the new film Son of Dracula suddenly slid into town in its world premiere engagement, escorted by its two principal actors, Harry Nilsson and Ringo Starr. It wasn't the biggest party in Atlanta since Gone with the Wind, but they tried. They tried.

     Nilsson, who has the title role, and Ringo, who plays an ancient Merlin the magician, hosted a press conference the afternoon of the initial showing to plump for the world's first rock and roll Dracula movie before attending the midnight preem at a North Atlanta shopping center.

     Although the two were ready for an arsenal of flip answers  ("Why did you decide to open the film in Atlanta?" Ringo: "Because nobody else would take it."), it was clear that Ringo had developed a serious interest in the technical side of filmmaking, perhaps as a result of his before the camera experience in the Magic Christian, 200 Motels, and the Richard Lester Beatles movies. 

    Ringo produced Son of Dracula after making a major script rewrite on the film, an experience which he doesn't particularly want to repeat, but which has made him anxious to direct a major project. His first attempt at film direction is a movie with Mark Bolan, which has not yet opened in the United States. "Film is a director's medium," says Ringo. "I have no desire whatsoever to produce any more. I want to stick with acting and direction, which is the extent of my interest, really."

     The movie, which Nilsson describes as a "science fiction horror musical about a boy and his bat," is the first of what may prove a new film form: the rock and roll monster movie. Since rock and roll and horror were many years staples of the drive-in movie crowd, this genre has strong commercial possibilities. Rock and roll movies, in their now hipper presentations (Mad Dogs and Englishmen, Woodstock) are still vying with horror films in outdoor theaters across the country. Why not combine the elements? Already, we have Paul Williams' Phantom of the Fillmore ready for release, and if it or Son of Dracula makes anything like a respectable amount of money, the floodgates will open. 

    "It's not the best film ever made, but I've seen worse," says Ringo of the movie, and most who saw it would agree with him. Ringo says the original script, which was presented to him, was "too flower power. The audience would have been asleep in 10 minutes." He decided to add some friction to the plot, and takes full responsibility for what's on the screen. And though Son of Dracula is not bad for a first try, its problem largely rests with that script. 

    The movie centers around Count Down, the son of Dracula, who was born a vampire and must glom necks for sustenance, but he is also into just about every kind of music there is, and occasionally he takes a break from the action to rush downstairs and perform with his band, which includes Keith Moon on drums. When Count Down comes of age, he will be crowned Overlord of the Netherworld, an occasion for which the assorted creeps of the Nether have been waiting for years. Doctor Van Helsing, Drac's enemy in the Bram Stoker novel, now his ally, noting Count Down's uneasiness over the coming affair proposes an operation which would take away his vampirism and implant within him the capacity for love, but would also wreck his claim to the Netherworld throne, and probably hack off its residence in the bargain. 

    Count Down agrees, though some monkey wrenches are thrown occasionally by a jealous rival for the throne, one Baron Frankenstein. I'll not spoil the ending. 

    The film features outstanding set designs and photography, and professional direction by Freddie Francis, a member of the Hammer Films Horror Corps, the guys who have spewed out those 40 or 50 beautiful British remakes of American classics with Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, is often lovely to look at, but the movie's stilted script sires uninspired and unbelievable performances. The dialogue is too earnest to be funny in most places. There are amusing moments, most of them coming when the idea of a rock and roll vampire is explored. Yet it's too showbiz and tongue-in-cheek to appeal to anyone unfamiliar with the career of its two stars.

    If Son of Dracula didn't feature Ringo and Nilsson, in fact, it would have had about as much general- audience appeal as a dubbed Mexican monster movie on television. American horror fans are used to seeing corny Hammer plots pulled off with sophistication and personality and made believable. Among other weaknesses, with Ringo's first line, one irrevocably refuses to believe he is Merlin, but that's just the monster movie element.

     It is a field day for Nilsson fans, including as he does nine songs. Added as an afterthought, according to Nilsson, the original script didn't have music, and only one new song, "Daybreak", written for the film, and accompanying them with film scenes of Nilsson lip-syncing to the album tracks, most of them coming from Nilsson Schmilsson and Son of Schmilsson. Since Nilsson does not perform in public, those who doted on the songs in their album incarnations will find it interesting to see Harry wailing away with his band with no interference from the movie plot. 

    All the songs are set pieces having nothing to do with the action, except for "Without You," which is played under the operation scene, and "Day Break," which, with its lyrical connection to the vampire theme. Harry has, of course, been photographed as a vampire before on the album cover of  Son of Schmilsson. Although Ringo has played on the album (as Richie Snare) he has never seen the cover art until two weeks after he offered Harry the lead in Son of Dracula.

     As is obvious from the cover and Ringo's work with SOD, both say they love monster movies and wanted to make one of their own. "We felt that it was time," said Harry. Both are careful to emphasize that musical element of the show because, as Ringo said, "There hasn't been a good Dracula movie made since Bela Lugosi." When asked if he thought Son of Dracula could compare with Lugosi's performance, he quickly said "No."

     Nilsson and Ringo talked about other projects besides their movie. Both have Richard Perry-produced albums in the works, not counting Harry's new release, The Son of Dracula soundtrack, which includes all nine tunes and dialogue from the film. Ringo's to be cut in May. Did he have the cooperation from the rest of the Beatles, which marked his Ringo album? "The only one who's cooperated up to now is John, who says he's written a song for me," said Ringo, "But then the last one was largely coincidental. I was recording for the first time in America, and some of them wound up helping, and they're still my mates, aren't they?"

     For the 50,000,000th time, Ringo answered a reporter's inquiry into whether or not the Beatles were planning to get back together rather officially. "I would like to say here and now, no". When asked about the lawsuits that surround the dissolving Beatles, Ringo made a distinction between "the thing between the four of us and the thing against Alan Klein," and said that the priorities dictated resolutions of the thing which separates the four Beatles. "That's the most important thing, and everybody knows it."

     Although Son of Dracula is credited as an Apple film, it is being independently distributed in America by Cinematian Industries, the people who brought you Fritz the Cat and the Cheerleaders. The soundtrack is manufactured by RCA, Nilsson's record company on the Rapple label.

     RCA took over after the press conference and turned Harry and Ringo over to a city that has been fairly throttled by publicists. The stars drove from their downtown hotel in a Son of Dracula hears to the premiere's theater, where hundreds of people waited on Nilsson Boulevard and Stare Drive to greet them. In front of a cardboard facade built to resemble the battlements of a castle, a huge hot air balloon was surveying the parking lot scene. A street dance punctuated by the glare of searchlights. A local radio station had promoted a contest. The outstanding 10 makeup jobs worn to the premiere would win Harry Nielsen watches. Each entrant won a watch. 

    Harry and Ringo bounded from the car to the bandstand and waved a few waves. They did a short advertisement for the movie. "All of you can't get inside the theater tonight, but come back next week and bring your friends." And then located themselves in the back of the house, where they had as much fun watching Son of Dracula as everybody else did